New Venture Challenge turns business visions into reality

Tuesday wasn't the first time Basham Johnson pitched the virtues of his new company, Alteg Systems, to potential business partners, clients and investors.

Officials with the Olive Branch company, which specializes in low-emissions, energy-efficient thermal electric generators for aircraft, already has had discussions with aerospace-industry heavyweight Boeing. But Johnson said those chats in turn meant he "had to deliver" Tuesday before a panel of judges and a crowd of spectators featuring no small number of potential investors and contacts.

Deliver he did. Alteg walked away from this year's installment of the Mississippi New Venture Challenge as winner of the annual event's pre-revenue division. Johnson and Alteg co-founder Jeff Lane will get $3,000, a host of free professional services like web hosting, legal and accounting assistance and perhaps the foundation to forge a slew of partnerships with companies like Boeing.

"We're offering something very unique, something we can bring to the market fairly quickly," Johnson said.

The New Venture Challenge each year seeks to find the most unique new enterprises in the state, in pre-revenue and student categories, and match them with investors, advisers and others that can help the companies flower into successful enterprises. The event is hosted by Innovate Mississippi, a nonprofit that seeks to grow the state's economy through technology.

Unlike Innovate's annual Startup Weekend events, the New Venture Challenge requires its participants to present specific revenue, customer and market projections as part of each pitch. So the verbal presentations, which often suggested a seasoned politician or preacher more than a budding entrepreneur facing his or her first professional audience, were buttressed with visuals containing lots of words, dollar signs, percentage points, bar graphs and pie charts.

Competitors had just 12 minutes to make their case and answer questions. Softly intoned messages of "You have 30 seconds" crept into the presentations, and a series of electronic beeps served as a clearly audible reminder that time was running out.

A panel of judges comprising area business executives asked constructive but sometimes blunt questions. One competitor was told by a judge, "I don't understand how this works." There were also many variants on the query of, "Where does the money/marketing come from?"

The 26 competitors presented a range of ideas.

There was Codey, an app its creators described as a "personal assistant" for medical patients that organizes treatment and prescription histories that can be instantly transmitted to hospitals in emergencies. There was Global Diversified Biosystems, which turns wastewater into clean water, electricity and biomass through such means as carbon capture. There was Nomna, described by its creators as an integrated social platform matching "evangelical foodies with farmers and the people they feed."

Sixteen-year-old Madeline Andrews wasn't scared by the thought of competing against people up to a decade her senior. After all, the Biloxi High School student launched MAC Styles hair-accessory company when she was 12. Her hand-designed products are now found in 20 stores in five states despite MAC having a staff of just Andrews and two others - her mother and grandmother.

She didn't place in the New Venture Challenge student competition but says the experience provided valuable insight into what she needs to do to boost her literally homegrown enterprise.

"I was very nervous but very excited," Andrews said. "I learned a lot of things I'll have to do if I'm going to expand (the business)."